Adios Mexico

So this is my final blog entry for now….maybe my new job will bring about a new safari blog…details to come…

So if you haven’t realized yet I am no longer in Mexico. After quitting our jobs we had a week to enjoy San Jose with no work. We spent a lot of nights out and days at the beach. Thursday night was our big celebration night. A big group of us went to our local watering hole, Red. It was Leonor, Kara, our French cowboy Philippe, and people from work (Nora. Sarai, Chucho, Ale, and Claudia). We drank and dance till 4am when the place closed. We had an amazing night. Saturday morning at 5am Kara, Leonor, and I got in the car and headed up the Baja. We drove through the most beautiful mountain range that overlooked the beach, and if I had an RV I could live in some of these tiny little beach towns for the rest of my life. We stopped half way up the Baja in this tiny town where Leonor worked her magic and got us a suite for $50. The we woke up the next morning and continued North to the border. We had one scary incident with the Federalies…and then finally came to Mexicali. We sat at the border crossing for 2hours and then finally we were in the states. We finished the final 4 hours of our trip and made it to Phoenix around 1am in the morning. We slept in the next day and then spent the next two days shopping. We then celebrated Christmas a week early with my family. Then the three of us girls headed to Texas. We showed Leonor Denton nightlife. This past Saturday we dropped Leonor at the airport and said our sad good byes…I feel this is where my blog should end. It was my final sad goodbye…

giving more thanks...

So here are the pictures from our Thanksgiving celebrations...breakfast, Nora and Francisco and their fancy cavier and lobster appetizers, Jeanne and Leonor's mom discussing the differnce between bad and good tequila, and kids from Jeanne's play...

At school yesterday I showed up and there was a giant nativity scence right outside my classroom. One of the wisemen was headless and he was carrying baking soda...not exactly how I remember it happening in the Bible...

So tomorrow is our last day of work. The kids have already been bringing in gifts like crazy....The sixth graders surprised us with a a big lunch yesterday. All the kids brought something. One of the dad's (who is a professional chef) made this amaing pasta with roasted tomatoes, spinach, and sausage meatballs. Other kids brought garlic bread, patee, cheese, bread, fanta, chips, and cake. It was all so amazing. My favorite part of everything is all the hugs. I cannot walk out of my classroom without getting a million hugs. One kids runs over and throws their arms around me, and then it sets off a chain reaction...its crazy, but I love it!

Thanksgiving

What a Thanksgiving week…Everything started on Thursday, actual Thanksgiving. Jeanne’s class put on the cutest play about Ike and Tina Turkey. Ike and Tina were these two kids pet. Ike and Tina overheard the parents saying that they are going to a dinner party for Thanksgiving. They aren’t sure what Thanksgiving is but they are so excited to go (Tina even is contemplating what to wear). The kids find out that their parents are planning on eating Ike and Tina for dinner so they dress the turkeys up like people and put them on a bus to our school in San Jose where there is a farm for them to live (I wanted to yell they would be better off being eaten then going to Mission…decided it wasn’t appropriate). When the parents find out that the turkeys are missing the kids tell them they will make a vegetarian dinner for all their parents’ friends. The food is disgusting, all the guest leave, and then everyone breaks into song with the music teaching singing the Turkey Day Blues. Very cute!

After school on Thanksgiving we went over to my friend Leonor’s house. Her mom is in town visiting and she was making the traditional Spanish dish called paella. It was so good!!! I wrote down specific instructions on how to make it so don’t you worry. It took us a few hours to prepare and make it. It’s this giant pan full of rice, onion, garlic, shrimp, chicken, pork, chorizo, crabs, clams, green beans, peas, and peppers….heaven in your mouth. We ate tons and drank a lot of wine. Boone’s farm and tequila were eventually brought out to. We were at Leonor’s house for about 8hrs. At some point her stuffed E.T. doll was brought out and that provided a lot of attention for us. We went around the table and said what we were thankful for in Spanish. Then Leonor’s mom wanted to know the story about the first Thanksgiving. Kara and I didn’t know the all words in Spanish so we decided to act it out for them (I was an Indian and I went hunting for food…Kara was my dear). We had a great and entertaining time. I ended the night sleeping on her couch while Kara, Leonor, her mom, and our friend Pepe kept drinking.

Yesterday we had our American Thanksgiving. I made a pumpkin pie on Friday night. I made the turkey, stuffing, and gravy yesterday. Kara made a sweet potato casserole. Jeanne made mashed potatoes, and Harry made veggies. Our friends Nora and Francisco came and they brought these yummy lobster and caviar appetizers. Leonor and her mom came and they brought an amazing chocolate cake, wine, and tequila. We were all so stuffed and we have enough leftovers to last us for weeks. Harry taught us this need strategy game using Q-tips and Jeanne learned how to take a proper tequila shot. She drank about half a bottle by the end of the night.

I thought it was funny because when I first moved here they wanted to give me the Patron Saint of Lost Causes since I was 24 and single. Well last night, once everyone tasted my cooking, all the Mexicans said that it’s official, that I could now get married because I could cook…gotta love the dating cultures of Mexico.

Poor Betty

Yesterday was in interesting day (I feel I keep using the word interesting a lot but no other word better describes our days). Well, I was happy yesterday because it meant that I was finally over with teaching Sex ED. That means I won’t have to hear any more questions like this one, “Miss Stateczny, what happens when you make sex and, how do you say, pee comes out?”…that was the exact wording…gotta love my kids… After school, Kara, Jeanne, and I got into the car to go home and at first Betty wouldn’t start. Finally I got her to start but she started bouncing up and down…something was definitely not right. We figured we should drive her to the mechanic right away. SO I put her in reverse and tried to back out of our spot and she died. We moved just enough to block our boss, Michelle, in. We sat there for a few minutes before we got her to start again. We literally drove across town with Betty bouncing up and down and making a weird noise. We were so afraid if we had to stop at any stop light Betty would die on us and that would be really bad because the Mexican drivers are bad at rear ending others…so at every light I had one foot on the break and one on the gas revving it. We got honked at multiple times and got many strange looks due to the shaking issue we were having. We finally got to the mechanic who speaks no English. Luckily, since the shaking was so obvious we really didn’t have to explain our problem. The guy just really shook some things, mumbled something about the air filter and the shaking and noise stopped. It was magic!!! We asked what we owed and he said nothing. So we went and got an 8 pack of beer and brought it back to him…we wanted to show him we were nice, grateful Americans. Afterwards we shopped for Thanksgiving groceries. The Jeanne and I decided to go have a drink and de-stress. We got to talking and she told me about her and Harry’s theory. They have been misplacing things like crazy since they have moved here. Apparently they weren’t like this she said in Minnesota. She told me that her and Harry don’t like to admit they are superstitious but they both really are. Well she then went on to say that they have felt a presence in the house, and that they think it’s a trickster, house elf and that he is the one that keeps hiding all their stuff. She said that in Northern England where Harry is from they have ways of getting rid of them. That they put money out and the elf will take it and leave. Also, you can buy a small set of clothes for them and lay them out and they will take them and go (it’s not that the money and clothes physically leave, it’s more like Day of the Dead where the Gods take the flavor out of the food, they don’t actually eat it). She said since they put the money out they have felt a change…so we will have to see how they are with misplacing things now…

The old science teacher at our school apparently was horrible. So much of the equipment doesn’t work and I’m sure it’s because she never watched the kids with it. Out of all my microscopes, only one works. Out of all my scales, only one works. So today when I was taking out the glass thermometers I really shouldn’t have been surprised that one was broken and leaking everywhere. This past teacher put a broken thermometer back into the case with all the thermometers…so guess who got Mercury on her hands. I was so mad and frightened since mercury can be deadly even if it only touches your skin. In the states we usually order thermometers that aren’t made with pure Mercury but with a Mercury mixture of some sort. This mixture, if you wash it off fast enough, is not as toxic. So I was panicking, because I was thinking this is MX and this is a Mexican thermometer, who knows what it has in it…there seems to be no health regulations in this country when it comes to anything. So I had to go have my principal call the Mexican company that produces these thermometers to find out what type of mercury was in it. They assured me that it’s safe but if I mysteriously get very ill in the next few weeks…this is probably why…

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving. We are celebrating Thanksgiving on Saturday. I cannot wait. We are having a big group of about 14 people. The only Americans will be just us 4. The rest of them are our new friends and their families. We are giving them their first traditional American Thanksgiving. I am preparing the turkey, stuffing, and pumpkin pie. Kara is making sweet potatoes. Harry and Jeanne are making veggies, mashed potatoes, and cranberries. My friend Leoner and her mom are bringing wine and a carrot cake. Erika, her best friend from MX city, and her son are bringing pasta salad, salad, bread and wine. Nora and her husband Francisco (plus their 2 kids) are bring appetizers and wine. Nora says her husband has been putting a lot of thought into appetizers. That he wants it to just be perfect for his first Thanksgiving. Tomorrow instead, Leoner and her mom invited us for dinner. Leoner’s mom lives in MX city but is from Spain. She is making us Paella a traditional Spanish dish. Last night I went and had martinis with her and her mom and they invited us over to make the food with them. So her mom is going to teach us how to make this dish. I’m so excited, it sounds so good.

Oh they finally put our pictures on the schools website the week before we leave…
http://www.elcolegiomission.com/maestros/profesores.html

Welcome to the Hotel California...

Today was an amazing day… I went on a day trip with my friend Leoner, her mom (who is visiting from MX city), and our other friend Pepe. We traveled to the Pacific coast. We first went to Todos Los Santos. Todos Los Santos is a tiny town and it is famous for 2 things. The Tropic of Cancer runs through it and Hotel California (from the Eagles song) is located there. We then went to Cerritos which is a small little isolated beach. You really are driving on the highway in the mountains and there is a tiny sign that says Cerritos. You drive about 2miles on a sand road with millions of holes in it. You see nothing but sand dunes and cacti. Then all of a sudden there is an opening where there is a little beach hut and it sits right in the middle of the beach. All around the hut (which is the restaurant/bar) are tables and lawn chairs. They had a jazz singer with a keyboard singing. It was just unreal. It was so relaxing. We sat at a table and had drinks. I had a nice mahi-mahi fillet with roasted veggies. We went swimming. We were going to go crowded but the waves were humongous and there were lots of professional surfers…I was not about to fight for waves with them. So we just swam. One point when I was getting out of the water I heard “Holly, Holly!” I was thinking, who else has the name Holly in Mexico. Well it ended up being the 3 girls I tutor. They were all there and they all came running with their ruffled swimsuits at me. They all gave me hugs and kisses and then I went and played with them in the water. It was so much fun. Towards the end of the day we all went for a walk down the beach and watched the sunset. This was one of the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. Since you are looking right onto the Pacific there is nothing obstructing the view. Also, it’s nice seeing how the sun changes the waters color as it sinks into it. It was amazing. I wish my camera could have captured what it really looked like.

very unpredicted

So this has been an interesting week at school. Kara, Jeanne, and I all quit our jobs. We are working till December 5. Kara and I are going to stay in San Jose through December and just enjoy ourselves. Then we will move back to the states and figure out what I should do with myself…AAAHHHHHHH…this is going to be stressful

After quitting this Monday I have already felt a lift of my shoulders and I am enjoying myself even more.

So this has been a fun weekend so far. Friday night started off by me and Jeanne attending a dance recital. My 3 girls that I tutor had a dance recital and it was so cute. Then yesterday Kara and I went with my friends to Cabo to an Irish Pub (not sure how many there are in MX). We sat outside and drank beer…it was so much fun. It overlooks the marina and it was a beautiful night.

Tomorrow my parents come for the day and I cannot wait!!!

Gucci

I tutor a family of 3 girls. This is there new puppy, Gucci. And yes, she is pink...